by Peter Orengo
Kenya is threatened with a terrorist attack, the United States warned Thursday.
According to the warning, suspected terrorists are targetting a hotel in Kenya in the capital Nairobi.
The U.S. Embassy in Nairobi said “terrorist groups may be plotting an attack against a major hotel” in the capital.
The embassy did not disclose the name of the hotel but said “it is believed to be a hotel popular with tourists and business travelers.”
The embassy urged hotel visitors in the area to be more aware of their surroundings, plan for emergency evacuations and monitor local media reports.
Al-Shabab, an Islamist group linked to al-Qaida, has carried out a series of attacks in Kenya.
The group attacked a high-end shopping mall in Nairobi in 2013, a four-day siege that killed 67 people. Al-Shabab gunmen also killed 148 people less than two years later as they targeted Christians at Garissa University in northeastern Kenya.
The most deadly attack in Kenya’s modern history was carried out by al-Qaida in 1998 when it bombed the U.S. Embassy in Kenya.
In 2011, Kenya deployed troops to neighboring Somalia, parts of which are controlled by al-Qaida, as part of an African Union peacekeeping campaign that helped force al-Shabab out of the Somali capital of Mogadishu.